


Fire and Ice

by ChromeHoplite



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Adult Ciel Phantomhive, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Foreplay, Fox Familiar, Ice King Sebastian, M/M, fairy tale, handjob, humping, ice king au, kind of cried writing this, mention of suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:09:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22080850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChromeHoplite/pseuds/ChromeHoplite
Summary: Legends say that in the desolate earldom of Phantomhive, an elusive fox roams by night, and those with the means of capturing it, will be granted their heart’s desire. But most legends are wrong, mistranslated and miscommunicated. Their truths are often too unnerving; for whom could sleep well if a fox stalked and lured its chosen few, or rest knowing a heart’s most honest desire, always buried so deeply, surfaces only once it's too late?
Relationships: Sebastian Michaelis/Ciel Phantomhive
Comments: 36
Kudos: 283





	1. The Familiar

**Author's Note:**

> Title: Fire and Ice  
> By: [Lovemyciel](https://lovemyciel.tumblr.com)
> 
> **  
> Fire and Ice  
> **  
> 
> 
> _By: Robert Frost_ ,
> 
> Some say the world will end in fire,
> 
> Some say in ice.
> 
> From what I've tasted of desire
> 
> I hold with those who favor fire.
> 
> But if it had to perish twice,
> 
> I think I know enough of hate
> 
> To say that for destruction ice
> 
> Is also great
> 
> And would suffice.

The arctic fox might have been hurt by the way it was limping, but it left no trace of blood in its wake. 

In fact, it left no trace at all. 

Despite its injury, it flit gracefully upon the twilit snow, feet undisturbing the glittering diamond flakes strewn haphazardly like stars in the sky. 

Ciel on the other hand, stumbled after it, shivering and hungry, boots crunching loudly and echoing in the night. Were it not for the bare trees, the moonlight would not have illuminated his way through the forest. Not that it mattered; in his haste to keep up with the beautiful animal, he had tripped thrice: once over a large branch, twice over his own feet. 

Every time he had, the fox paused and blinked its wine-coloured eyes, appraising him. Waiting for him. 

“J-ju-just stay there,” Ciel chattered in a whisper on his hands and knees. The cold stung his fingers like fire and he cupped them to his mouth to breathe life into them once more. The tips were a pallid blue, hurting when he curled them into fists to keep them warm. At least they still hurt. Numbness was what frightened him. 

Some days he felt it creeping in, like a mistress trying to insinuate herself into his frozen heart. Were it not for the desolate resentment and anger that propelled his blood and kept the sanguine muscle pumping, she might have stood a chance. 

The fox turned tail when Ciel rose again. The bend in the path took it out of his line of sight, so he trudged on, head down against the increasing wind and blinding flecks of ice that pelted his face. 

If he could just reach it. Just lay a hand on it, he could atone for his sins, or so the legend said. He remembered being young, huddled by the fire with his brother when his father had recounted the tale of the elusive alabaster fox that prowled their earldom. If caught, the fox would grant a wish, any wish, in exchange for its release. 

Determined, Ciel had wandered for years in search of it, ever since he’d been cursed to endure the guilt of survival. No matter what he did, or where he went, despair dogged him, plagued him from beyond the grave and robbed him of sound sleep.

And just as he’d lost all hope, had set his affairs in order and acquired _Inheritance Powder_ to mimic the symptoms of cholera, it had appeared below his window at midnight. Slowly, it hobbled to the mouth of the forest lining the manor’s north end, allowing him to give chase. 

The sun had risen and set twice since then, and Ciel felt the passage of time like the slow, maddening drip of melting ice. Seconds scorned him for centuries. Minutes mocked him for millennia. 

But as Ciel pushed through the decaying brambles and frozen nettle stuck to his thin nightshirt, the fox came to a halt before a cave whose entrance was a thick wall of solid ice. It mirrored their reflections in a blueish hue, and the sight made Ciel shiver and grit his teeth. He wondered if he was as frostbitten as he appeared. 

Slowly, he crept forward, hands up to show he meant no harm. The fur along the fox’s tail puffed out as it whisked back and forth, its front paws scraping fruitlessly against the ice wall as it gave a quick series of playful gekkering.

Had Ciel blinked, he would have missed it. One moment, the fox was there, the next he’d bounded gracefully through the barrier as if it hadn’t been there at all. 

Automatically, Ciel lurched forward to follow it. The breath he’d been unconsciously holding whooshed from his lungs and rebound in his face, dousing it in a mordant chill. It stirred something inside him, something he thought had died along with his family, lost to him forever: hope. 

He pressed his fingers against the cold surface, knowing as he did so that he would not feel it nip his sensitive skin. Rather, he passed through it like a veil, from one world to the other. It eased him into solace, opening the padlocked door to his heart. It was not the only transformation; with every inch of his body that revealed itself to the other side, his tarnished nightgown became a dusky blue satin robe whose sheer sleeves and bottom were adorned by a delicate ribbon of leavers lace. 

He was too distracted to notice that the ice underfoot did not sting his bare feet, nor did they slip and slide as he strode after the fox. His eyes were glued to the creature, for it too had altered: its tail had multiplied and its form became more fluid, as if it were fluctuating between several species. And unhurt. Gone was the staggered limp. Instead, it padded across the floor gracefully, casting covert looks back to make sure Ciel was keeping up. 

It meandered its way around crystalized stalactites hanging low from the cavernous ceiling which reflected the Aurora Borealis. They were fang-like in appearance and dangerously sharp; so sharp in fact, that when Ciel's curiosity got the better of him and he let his hand slide over the pointed tip, it tore into his flesh with nary a brush. 

Blood dripped in beads upon the floor at his right, leaving a breadcrumb trail like in Hansel and Gretel. The only difference was that he was hoping not to make use of it to trace his way back home. 

A whistle broke through the otherwise silent atmosphere. Soft, dulcet. The kind of sound that could seep into a body and lull it to that precarious stage where one was unsure if they were asleep or not. Where the sensation of falling so often accompanied a jerking back to reality. 

The fox-creature bound smoothly after the source of the melody and out of sight down the long, convoluted ice hall. 

Ciel took two clumsy steps after it, “Wait!” and fell to his knees, endurance stretched to the very limit. Fatigue and hunger ate through him. The echo of his slurred cry continued to reverberate shakily throughout the enormous chamber. “Wait…” he mumbled. His heartbeat slowed in his ears, and he synchronized his shallow breathing to it. Suddenly, he was confused. Where was he? Had he taken the arsenic on his bedside table? Whose feet were approaching him? He could barely lift his head to follow the black leather of the boots upwards before darkness consumed him.


	2. Diamonds & Ash

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 1 was from Ciel's POV, this second, smutty one is from Sebastian's.
> 
> Here is the stunning art @lovemyciel made in collaboration with this fic. Click [here](https://lovemyciel.tumblr.com/post/190201766324/fire-and-ice-such-a-fetching-little-thing) to see it.

It had been a long time coming; a decade since he’d first lain his vulpine eyes on the boy. As a child, Ciel had been the timid counterpart to his mirror image. He’d been overlooked and underestimated; that kind of indifference left a significant stain on one’s soul. It flavoured him with an acrimonious resentment that only a devil like himself could appreciate. 

He would never judge the little thing that he carried in his arms. Not for what he’d done to survive, nor for it having been in vain when he’d decided he’d had enough. After all, it was Ciel’s hardened desolation that had permitted him to pass through the gate into his lair. 

Sebastian did not perceive the young man in rose-coloured glasses the way most lovers admired the objects of their affections, but rather with surreal ones. He could hardly believe that the day had come. That Ciel was here, inhaling the same air he himself respired. That the heat from Ciel’s body bled into his skin, causing a maelstrom of turbulent emotions unknown to humans. Unknown, until this moment, to himself. 

He should have anticipated it after years of stalking him through his familiar, chasing his carriage, sitting outside his study window and seeking vengeance against each and every individual who had humiliated him during that fateful month. He’d have loved nothing more than to do it with his bare hands, to clutch their pitiful heads within the cradle of his claws and see the light dim from their pleading eyes. They got off easy in his opinion, for he was an accomplished sadist and would not have been satisfied by simply mauling them to death.

But his imprisonment had been absolute for centuries. The evidence of it lined the halls in which he strode. Hundreds of subjects, frozen for all of eternity. Wretched wanderers who’d drifted in, caught up by the myth of the fox, in search of their fame and fortune. Their souls might have met the requirements to pass through his infernal gateway, but he had deemed them ignoble, undeserving. 

_Not Ciel_ , he thought, depositing him on the floor before his throne, where his familiar curled up. Its tails ensconced the young man’s small frame, and in turn, Ciel’s fingers unconsciously knotted themselves in the lustrously thick fur. 

Sebastian sat upon his throne, waiting. Waiting. His long claws tapped a redundant rhythm, _one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four,_ along the chair’s glacial armrests. One svelte leg crossed over the other, bouncing impatiently. Ciel lay on his side, and the demon traced the young man’s body with an ungodly gaze; admired the softness and pallor that came from lack of labour and sunlight. Watched him breathe in and out, chest rising and falling, tiny puffs of condensed little clouds issuing from his mouth. His lashes fluttered fast, shadowing his flushed cheeks and Sebastian’s fingers tingled with the need to touch him, to knead the slight curve of his hip, to thumb his lips apart and taste him. 

_Wake up,_ he willed the young man, silently mouthing the words. Though he did not hear him, Ciel moaned in answer. The sleepy sound was low and throaty, spurring the demon’s desire. He whistled again, hushing the melody, and Ciel turned his head toward him, the way some flowers moved in the direction of the sun. 

“That’s it,” he encouraged, out loud this time. Ciel’s fingers twitched and his face nuzzled the fur anew, resisting the urge to regain his consciousness. 

Sebastian locked eyes with his familiar, who understood. Gently, the fox rose, abandoning the boy to drape himself around his master’s shoulders. The demon shuddered pleasantly; it smelled like the boy, winter cold and crisp, with the hint of something warmer lurking at his core. Inhaling him deeply, he closed his eyes as he committed the scent to memory. He was utterly lost to it, and when he opened them again, Ciel was on his feet, standing before the lower step leading to his throne. 

“I touched your fox,” the young man told him expectantly with a hint of false bravado. He stood defiantly, arms crossed. 

Sebastian cocked his head, interest lighting his crimson depths. “And I have permitted you to live, despite your trespass,” he responded coyly, stroking one of the many tails belonging to his familiar, black nails raking through like a sword cutting silk. 

“You lured me here, on purpose” Ciel swallowed, and undeterred, he climbed the first two steps. “To what end?” 

“What makes you think that you’re owed an answer?” Though he admired the young man’s nerve, it was his entitlement that was amusing to behold. And yet it was not enough; he wanted to ignite the fire he knew burned inside of Ciel, so that he could steal his warmth and perish in his flames. 

Ciel expelled an audible, yet cut off breath. “I’m owed more than that after what I’ve endured getting here.” 

“Look around you, little one.” He gave a flourish of his hand to the humans-turned-ice sculptures, their crystallized forms glittering shades of green and purples from the dancing flames in the night sky. “You think your suffering is unique?” 

“If you wanted another subject for your royal court, you would have let the cold claim me.” Confidently, Ciel drew himself to his full height. There was a subtle curl to the corner of his lips as his words, laden with truth, taunted the Ice King. But the simmering smile was short-lived; stretching into an all-out grin. A palpable heaviness settled between them like a presage to a storm. Their eyes met and Ciel saw much more than himself mirrored in the King’s ruby ones; it was nothing. An emptiness. A hungry void. A sharp contrast to Ciel’s abundance: his excessive guilt, his inordinate despair. _Here,_ he thought, heart beating a mad tattoo against his ribs, is someone who could take his burden and remain unaffected. 

“I could still freeze you. Punish that tongue of yours for insubordination.” In a show of annoyance and dominance, Sebastian allowed the temperature to dip, and the young man shivered almost instantly, knees knocking, arms embracing his torso more firmly. 

“I… I don’t th-think so,” Ciel mumbled, teeth chattering. “All… all this t-time, the m-myth was wr-wrong… It… it wasn’t the...the p-person ch-chasing the fox who… who needed the… the wish, was it? It’s _you_ that n-needs some...something… W-what is it you… you wa-want from m-me?” 

Sebastian quirked his brows, fixing Ciel with an incredulous stare. He opened his mouth to speak, but closed it at once. He was speechless. He understood the words the young man had used, but not the order in which they were stated. In all his years, imprisoned by his isolation, none of the individuals who had come to seek his favour had ever considered _his_ needs. _His_ wishes. They had been content in their gluttony, and he, bored by it. 

A tentative smirk played upon Sebastian’s lips as he let the surprise of Ciel’s request sink in. He knew the boy had been special, that the tempest brewing in his soul would make him a lofty companion. 

“Come,” Sebastian said, patting his lap with one hand, and opening up his royal mantle with the other. The silk rustled over his thighs as he uncrossed his legs. 

To his credit, the young man did not hesitate. A vainglorious pride welled up inside the Ice King; he had chosen well. Ciel’s chivalry was such that Sebastian had no doubt he would have followed through with any demand he had made. 

Sebastian watched intently as Ciel closed the distance between them, climbing up the last steps. The boy’s Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed, before wordlessly straddling the King’s thighs. He wrapped his mantle around Ciel’s shoulders, whose tension seemed to melt from them the moment they felt its weight. Instinctively, Sebastian’s large, clawed hand ran down the young man’s back. Under the thin fabric, under his delicate, porcelain skin, he could feel Ciel’s muscles tighten at his touch. 

“Shhh…” Sebastian crooned in the boy’s ear. His warm breath washed over Ciel and the latter closed his eyes and relaxed. “I won’t hurt you. I’ve longed for you.” 

“Is that so?” Ciel muttered, leaning into Sebastian's chest. Under the mantle, he flushed, too perplexed for once to linger on his own inadequacies. It was liberating to not dwell on the past or worry about the future. To simply focus on the present, the warmth, and his hammering heart. 

“I have,” the Ice King answered, suddenly breathless and unable to hide his enthusiasm under the boy’s bottom. His hand crept lower by inches, caressing the small of Ciel’s back. Rather than still once more, the young man guided the King’s right hand to join its left counterpart. There, they slid along Ciel’s hips, where they pulled them snuggly to his own. 

“Nngh.” Ciel trembled deliciously as the King’s cool, velvety lips trailed from his ear to his neck. The young man craned it back, exposed for him to lick the pulse that beat wildly in his throat. 

“Such a fetching little thing,” Sebastian spoke into the skin, mouthing his way up to Ciel’s jaw. “I was so consumed by you, by your frozen demeanour.” 

“And now?” Ciel asked, snaking his hands possessively around the King’s neck. Promptly, the fox glided from his perch and gave its master his privacy.

“You are better than any fantasy I conjured. Warmer by far, softer.” He squeezed Ciel’s backside, pushing him against the significant bulge that had grown there. His eyebrows furrowed at the pressure, and he nipped Ciel’s flesh. “Delicious in scent and in taste. I want to hear all your sounds echo in this bitter, lonely room. I want to keep you. To adore you in this way.” 

Ciel gave a plaintive moan, rocking his hips in lazy circles atop the King’s hard, swelling ridge. “Then do it.” 

Sebastian’s cock throbbed and twitched each time the young man ground along its length, dampening the silk between them. His hands slid up and down Ciel’s thighs, nails raking the skin and leaving pink scratches in their wake. They reached under his satin robe and fingered the little bows on Ciel’s undergarments. The gasp when he tugged gently on them and they fell apart at the boy’s sides was more than rewarding. 

Ciel was hard already; his cock rebounded against Sebastian's taut belly. It leaked as the King wrapped his fingers around it. The boy's mouth went slack, his forehead rested on Sebastian's shoulder, but he moved on his knees, fucking the hand fisting his length. 

"What a good little imp," Sebastian praised. The friction, the heat, the uncomfortable strain under his robe; he'd forgotten what passion felt like. "Do you want more?" He asked, pleased that Ciel's bouncing had his royal garment riding up. 

"Ahhh… nnngh… yes," the young man mewled, turning his head toward the King. He lowered his high collar and kissed his neck with tongue and teeth. 

Sebastian broke off an icicle from his throne's arm and gave it a suck, shaping the wide end so that it was rounded smooth. Spreading Ciel's backside one-handed, he pressed the ice against his twitching hole. 

Ciel hissed and pursed his lips as it pushed into him, little by little, melting down his thighs the deeper it went. He sighed, holding still, accommodating it. Sebastian began pumping both his cock and fucking him with his makeshift toy. 

The King revelled in the parroted moans that bounced off the walls, off the frozen surfaces that encased his many staring subjects. The heat from Ciel’s body rolled off him wave after tantalizing wave, until only Sebastian’s fingers were left to prepare him. Two went in, scissoring and stretching, stroking the soft insides. They slipped in and out, in and out, in long, slow slides. The boy bucked against his hand, and he explored Ciel’s clenching channel, brushing a hard little nub, tapping it, tapping it. 

“N-no! N-no! Sss-stop!” Ciel insisted, legs shaking, cock convulsing, a sobbing moan constricting his throat. 

Sebastian obeyed, content to see the young man’s horror-stricken lust writ large on his face. His pupils were blown, and sweat, delicious sweat, dripped down his hairline, accumulating in the notch of his exposed clavicle. 

“You have never looked so captivating,” Sebastian murmured, withdrawing his fingers from Ciel, who quavered. He pulled up his royal garment, freeing his throbbing cock from underneath, and gently turned the boy around so that his back rested against him. The King’s length was such that, as the boy settled, it rubbed against his own. They pulsed together, sticky, clear fluid spilling from both, gummy on Ciel’s hand when he felt the weight of Sebastian’s. 

“My, my,” he chided seductively in Ciel’s ear, clutching the boy’s throat to tilt his head skywards. ”How are we going to fit all of that inside of you, when you’re ever so small.” 

“It… it’ll fit,” Ciel croaked, and Sebastian felt his greedy little hole flutter against the base of his own cock. 

“I’m not so sure, my darling,” he egged the boy on, voice low, oozing with darkness. 

Determination spiked the boy’s resolve, and he dug his heels just above the King’s knees. He lifted himself slightly, allowing Sebastian’s cock to spring back, angling itself perfectly toward the young man’s entrance. Clutching the throne’s ice-cold armrests, he sank onto it. 

Sebastian covered Ciel’s hands with his own as he did so, growling his need which had shifted from ache to urgency. It was a ferocious thing, basking in the cascade of fire that ran up his lover’s spine and tore a gasp from his lips. He wasn’t even completely sheathed yet when Sebastian thrust up to meet him. The impulse had been uncontrollable and the boy writhed, stuffed almost to the point of pain and whimpering. 

“T-take my legs,” he pleaded the King, shaking beyond the point of endurance. “And make me forget.” 

Sebastian gripped the young man under the knees and raised his calves, spreading them. He fucked into him slowly, burying himself to the hilt when Ciel arched his back. He swelled and throbbed, relishing the strangulating hold of the boy’s body every time he withdrew the tiniest bit. And the hotter Ciel felt in his arms, the quicker, the harder Sebastian began pounding into him. 

“So… so full…” Ciel whined through gritted teeth, seeing his belly bulge under the perspiration-soaked satin of his robe. 

“Touch yourself. Let me see,” the King gnarled, looking over Ciel’s shoulder at the boy’s neglected, weeping cock. 

“C-can’t like this…” he stuttered. 

“A shame,” Sebastian slowed his brutal thrusts and eased the boy off. 

Colt-legged, he turned and impaled himself most willingly, took his cock in hand, and bit down hard on Sebastian’s shoulder as he rode the King. He was wailing one moment, screaming the next. 

Sebastian could feel the punch of Ciel’s fist against his stomach with every upward stroke of his hand over his cock’s head. He slammed into him, holding him by the hips, flesh pounding and slapping noisily, both of them panting, the heat of their bodies slowly dissolving the throne beneath them. Overhead, the ceiling dripped and the kingdom walls wept dying ice, thawing at first, then pooling in puddles along the hall. 

“Look… look at me,” the King ordered. His pleasure spiralled tighter, hotter, though it was not the blaze that lit in Ciel’s eyes as he held them. Passion had tightened the young man’s features and they were strong and beautifully resolved. “What is your wish?” 

Ecstatic tears ran down Ciel’s face as his pleasure mounted. He was barely audible between his moans and grunts, but Sebastian felt him mumble the words on his lips, and they were as clear as if the boy had shouted them. “Keep me.” 

“Always.” The King kissed his little saviour hard on the mouth, spilling into him as the boy spattered against his stomach. They shuddered, moving together, chests heaving, muscles sore and spasming, clinging to one another in desperate, reckless abandon. Numbness spread through them, licking their flesh like the flames of a frozen pyre, consuming them. 

Smiling, Ciel pulled away just in time to lay his head on Sebastian's heart. 

The boy’s breathing ceased before his own, and Sebastian’s mantle came around him one last time. An adoring crimson gaze fell upon his companion. He kissed his lips again, his nose, the wisps of crystal silk that was his hair, refusing to separate from him in any capacity; -and as winter fell upon him, Sebastian’s cheek rested on the boy’s head and his eyes shed tears of diamonds. Weighed down by their sheer gravity and significance, the ice sculpture fractured, shattering into a trillion resplendent shards.

Spring came early that year; with it, an abundance of flooding in the earldom. Nobody knew why; as far as everyone was concerned, it had not snowed much, if any, after Yule. But the further people wandered into the majestic forest, the more inundated it became.

It was hardly the only mystery. 

They puzzled over the earl’s disappearance and the reappearance of hundreds of individuals; some of them long-lost relations that had lived generations ago. More enigmatic was the impenetrable cavern that had been here in December, and gone with the vernal equinox. In its place, where none suspected a throne to have sat for millennia, an ash sapling grew, guarded vigilantly by an ancient arctic fox.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **NB: Traditionally, Ash trees are symbolic of change, of the destruction and riddance of the old to make room for new. It's also associated with rebirth (ie: to rise from the ashes).**
> 
> Very slowly, the fandom and content are dwindling. You can make a difference and motivate writers and artists by showing your love and leaving a kudos and/or comment <3
> 
> Please send some love in the form of an ask to [LOVEMYCIEL](https://lovemyciel.tumblr.com/) on tumblr.  
> You can find me there too: [chromehoplite](https://chromehoplite.tumblr.com/)

**Author's Note:**

> Chapter Two is written and ready to go in a couple of days. 
> 
> A huge thanks to [@lovemyciel](https://lovemyciel.tumblr.com/) for her art inspiration and for collaborating with me on this fic. It's an absolute honour. Check out the awesome art she made for it [here](https://chromehoplite.tumblr.com/post/190043117184/legends-say-that-in-the-desolate-earldom-of)
> 
> A big big shout out to my cubby [@teasmudge](https://teasmudge.tumblr.com/) for always lending me her beta brain. 
> 
> Kudos & Comments fill my belly - please feed me!


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